For different functions I have five different email accounts: one for this blog, one for my volunteer work, one for research, one for most business, and one for secure banking that has on other online presence at all. I had to set up the last two on my notebook, because I have a new ISP. But for the first three, my main computer has them configured as IMAP accounts, but on the notebook, they were still configured at POP3. I have a king size mess on my hands, and most of my research material just went up in smoke. AGuess what I’ll be doing most of today? ARGH!! Tomorrow, I’ll be gone most of the day getting my MRI, so expect a Personal Update at most.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 4:27 (average 6:32). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: While Wisconsin Governor and likely Republican presidential candidate Scott Walker is a favorite among business leaders looking for favors and wealthy Americans keen on slashing government to the bone if they can shave a quarter-point off their effective tax rates, among the evangelical crowd he’s a bit of an also-ran. What’s he done for them lately?
So Walker is off to do some fence-mending and appropriate knee-bending.
Next week, the Wisconsin governor will travel to Capitol Hill to hold a private meeting with influential evangelical leaders, some of whom are expressing deep reservations about his track record on issues near and dear to them. Pointing to his past statements, and even his hire of a top campaign aide, they are openly questioning whether his views on abortion and gay marriage align with theirs and whether he’s willing to fight for their cause.
There may once have been a time when there was more to having religion than an obsessive policing of other people’s sex lives, perhaps there was a bit of caring for the sick or feeding the poor or loving thy neighbor in there, toward the back, but no more. Support all the wars you want, give your personal thumbs-up to the death penalty and to state-sanctioned torture, tell impoverished Americans or people without health insurance that you’re very sorry for their plight but you’ll be dead in the cold ground before your government does a damn thing for them—it’s all fine. But you’d better have the right opinion on abortion and keeping the gay people in line.
I have no doubt that the Fartfuhrer of Fitzwalkerstan will goose-step with the Republican Party’s most rabid Supply-side pseudo-Christian hate mongers.
From Common Dreams: Today’s verdict does not reflect the values of the majority of people in our Commonwealth. The ACLU of Massachusetts has been disappointed from the start that the federal government sought the death penalty in Massachusetts, which has rejected capital punishment. The last execution in the state of Massachusetts took place in 1947. Even in this case, Massachusetts opposition to the death penalty has been reflected in public opinion polls, in the pleas of religious leaders, and in statements by victims’ families and survivors. In a Boston Globe poll conducted this April, Massachusetts residents—by a four-to-one margin—overwhelmingly opposed the imposition of a death sentence for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Massachusetts religious leaders voiced their opposition to seeking his execution. Victims’ families and survivors in this case asked that federal prosecutors take the death penalty off the table and, instead, accept a sentence of life in exchange for no possibility of appeal or parole…
This statement came from the MA ACLU. I agree. I certainly will not argue that Dzhokhar is not a monstrous person, who "deserves" the death penalty. In this case, the death penalty is working exactly as it was designed to work under ideal circumstances. However, the most important objection still remains. Whether or not we strap this man down and kill him is not about who he is or what he did. It’s about who we are and what we are doing. By imposing the death penalty our federal government makes is all just like Dzhokhar.
From Think Progress: For thousands of years, religious people have gathered together in houses of worship to sing songs, celebrate sacred rituals, and lift up prayers to God(s) on high. And on July 1, a new religious group in Indiana intends to do just that — but with a lot more emphasis on the “high” part.
A little more than a month from now, the newly-formed First Church of Cannabis is scheduled to hold its first official gathering, where worshippers plan to test the limits of new religious freedom laws by “filling up” the sanctuary with marijuana smoke while observing a sacrament.
“It’s going to be a standard service,” Bill Levin, the group’s leader and self-proclaimed “Grand Poohba and Minister of Love,” told ThinkProgress. He explained the ceremony will last around 45 minutes, complete with music and teachings, but will conclude with an unusual benediction: “At the end of the service … we will enjoy cannabis, because it’s how we enjoy life.”
This is clearly a false religion. I have no problem with them getting high, but the source of all blessing is the Church of the Ellipsoid Orb. May the Orb shine its holy light upon you! 😉
Cartoon:
Homosexuality is the reason for floods, hurricanes, and of course, 9/11. You might as well tack on the Amtrak crash this week to its long list of accomplishments. When it came to light that the engineer on the train was a supporter of gay rights, and possibly gay himself, that was all the opening the haters needed. Anti-gay haters like Chuck C. Johnson and the editors of WorldNetDaily [World Nut Daily Delinked]immediately jumped aboard that runaway train of thought, citing dubious statistics about higher rates of mental illness in the gay community.
Senate Democrats on Wednesday relented in their opposition to the consideration of legislation expediting trade agreements, just 24 hours after their vote blocking the bill put a temporary halt on President Obama’s trade agenda.